The Development of Management Style Towards21st Century
UKa Wai,Mina Macau Polytechnic Institute
1. Introduction
Libraries and information Services (LIS) always give people an image of tidiness and silence, but it is not the scene at the back offices. Piles of books, videos, magazines, catalogues and many other materials are on the desks, or on the floor. What makes the chaos? Human Being is not born with the sense of management. The word "manage" came from the Italian word "manneggiare" which means to handle (horses). Work force, like the horses, if they are being properly arranged, trained and controlled, they can achieve efficiency and high productivity.
Management was not a new idea in history, but it was not been theorized until the 19 century when new inventions and new machinery prospered during the industrial revolution. The establishment of factories put people together for mass production and the structure of organization then naturally formed.
LIS are non-profit organization depended on the parent body e.g. university, municipal, state government, or information center. Its objectives are based on preservation of culture and intellectual wealth, academic and education, information retrieval and research center, etc. The staff is more concerned on job satisfaction, job security and advancement than money incentive.
Due to the social, political, economic and technological changes, LIS are also facing the challenge of change. Change can be the road to further development or the trap of malfunction. The managers or librarians with qualified professional skills have no doubts on the treatment of the collections, but it is argued that most of them have not had enough proper training in management. How jobs are allocated and coordinated under the pressure of changes are depended on the management skills. Position, title and authority are believed to have lesser power of the success to modern management.
The evolution of management began in the classical approach, it stressed on the structure and mechanic of an organization. Subsequently, the behaviorists had arguedhuman relations should be included in management as employees were the core element to execute the management functions. The contingency approach encountered the effect on the internal and external environment. The Japanese management had a significant influence to the modern world.
2. The Classical Management Thoughts
The influence of the concept of Bureaucracy by German sociologist Max Weber (1864-1920) encountered its significance in the existence of a formal hierarchical structure of autocratic and centralized management. Bureaucracy had rooted in the traditional LIS structure due to the professional based environment. Expertise and profound knowledge in particular field such as cataloguing, classifications are being needed. The studies of Scientific Management by Frederick Taylor (1856-1915) and his followers still verified on designing the standard methods in the work process. With clear definitions and assignments of work, managers could execute performance appraisal to control the outcome and make improvement. The tasks in LIS departments such as acquisition, cataloguing, classifying, public attendance was a chain of work that had been broken down and allocated to different department. Then the departments subdivided the task into procedures and shared with the colleague. Although its significance was argued by many modern theorists like Tom Peter that scientific management has proven inadequate, still the principles such as division of labor, work method were universal in management. Henri Fayol (1842-1925) emphasized on the 14 administrative principles and 5 basic functions established a clear framework [1] of managing the work process effectively. The structure of LIS also applied these principles as standard and the functions as the key factors to manage.
2. The Behavioral Science Approaches to Management
The functions of modern management include planning, organizing, staffing, coordinating and controlling. The classical theorists devoted mainly on the structure and mechanics of organizations and ignored the human factors. People are more complex than machines; individual psychological state varies to values, perceptions, beliefs, environment, and time-scale etc. Staffing is what we called Human Resource Management today could mend the insufficiency. The Function of staffing is to get the right people to work in the right place effectively and efficiently in direction to achieve company's objective. The studies of the behaviorists have provided more understanding human relation problems. The early behaviorists like Hugo Munsterbery (1863-1919)stated that the study of human behavior at work could improve effectiveness and efficiency and contributed suggestions to improve methods of employed testing, training, performance evaluations and job efficiency. Abraham Maslow's (1908-1970) 5 steps Hierarchy of Needs explained that managers should aware of the state of needs of their subordinates. McGregor (1906-1964)' s Theory of X and Y divided employees into 2 sets of work behavior within an organization. Theory X type tended to dislike work and responsibility. Money was the only motivational force to work. Theory Y type tended to be self-motivated with given conditions Frederick Herzberg's "Motivation-Hygiene" theory focused on the studies of satisfaction at work. He stated the positive factors of job satisfaction were motivators and the negative factors were the hygiene factors. Elton Mayo (1880-1949) emphasized on teamwork, according to his Hawthorne Studies on 1924-1932, he found out the importance of individual and group work behavior, morale and attitude were more important than work flow and efficiency procedure. Rensis Likert (1903-1981) of his research work on motivation, leadership and organization structure stated Participate-group was the most effective management style as subordinates could involve in management, consequently achieved high productivity and low absenteeism. Blake and Mouton's research on Managerial Grid (1964) explored the importance of cohesive work group of Team Management and to achieve efficiency.
3. Contingency Approaches to Management
Tannenbaum and Schmidt's Contingency Management stated that the uncertainty of the modern world was mostly depended on situations. Managers have to prepare and predict all kinds of changes. Bruns and stalker's (1961) studies on mechanistic and organismic management systems also stated the organismic management system was much appropriated to the unstable environment.
4. The Influence of Japanese Management
The studies of W. Ouchi's (1981) Theory Z explained the successful stories of the Japanese companies. The Theory Z organization included lifetime employment that ensures job safety. Tasks oriented such as 'Quality circles' permitted employees from all levels to work together in regular meeting basis. Participation of all members in different levels has the equal right and opportunity to express their ideas. Consensus encouraged the team spirit in the collective decision making process. The Japanese perception pf "Gimu" helped a lot in construction of loyalty, sense of belonging,commitment and cooperation with groups.
5. The Challenges of Change
The work life in 1950's depended mainly on manual work in LIS. Lots of cards i. e. titles, authors, references cards were produced manually in cataloguing. Columns of drawers were needed to store them for later manual searching. In the 1990's, lots of the routine manual works are changed. Technologies are emphasized and computerized LIS reduced lots of manual work. The operators only need to input once the data in the database of the on line cataloguing and the computer system will automatically sort the data and prepare for call number and retrieval of information of all kinds.
The changing work nature in LIS is to response the external environment through time scale.
·Political: The world is now becoming peaceful after the World War II. Dissolution of the USSR and some European communist countries, the reunion of Germany at the end of 1980's. China's open market and the international agreement of reduce arm force provided a stable political environment in the 1990's. The internationalization stimulates the cross country communication and sharing of information in LIS field.
·Economic: The population growth and business expansion of the last 50 years accelerated the world economy. The economical growth stimulated the libraries and information services expanded in size, location, type and the number of collections.
·Social: The economical prosperity made life easy. Quality of work life in 1980's reflected the changing attitudes of the workers to a new philosophy of better working condition. Specialized manual workers of the 1950's are changing to multi-skilled workers in 1990's with higher pay and educational background. The explosion of computer technologies forced the LIS people to possess additional skill in computer.
·Technological: Advancement in information technologies makes delivery of information available at home. The developments of electronic publishing, multimedia, networking and Internet cut the distance and facilitate the search of information in shorter time. End-user products as CD-ROM, VCD, DVD, floppy disk and World Wide Web provide other choices of information other than libraries.
6. The Trends of Management Towards the 21st Century
The classical theories of Taylor school suggested the authority in administration, specialization at work process and money rewards, but human factors were ignored. The behavioral school of Herzberg and Maslow modified the deficiency of Taylor by adding the human relation variables. Monetary rewards were not the only incentive to workers. Job satisfaction and motivation were essential to retain the staff. The success of the business depended mostly on the staff[2]. Human Resource Management is a strategic tool focused on motivation and morale to initiate training and development, motivating, monitoring and retaining the staff. The allocation of work depended upon the theories of organization. Important writer like Peter Drucker focused on setting the company mission (what is the purpose to set up the business) and setting objectives (What the companies want to achieve in short term and long term). The impact of Theory Z and Japanese Management transformed the traditional hierarchical organization structure to a flatter structure that encouraged and improved the up-down, lateral communication and integration, created the sense of group cohesiveness and coordination. The role of leadership and how to motivate staff by Peters and Waterman's book "In search of Excellence" concluded that leadership was essential to managers to direct and coordinate among work groups within an organization.
Although the nature of LIS constrained the pace of development in management style, the LIS people are trying hard encountering the contemporary management as part of their professionals. The reactions of the staff are the mirror of the external changes. These changes can be the risks and problems because people always resist to change or challenge and opportunity for further development if the employees can adapt the change. Managers or librarians are the key persons initiate a dynamic leadership. They should have the ability to tackle the external changes and innovate the internal work. Stated mission of the organization must be clear to all the staff. Objectives should be set in long, mid, and short term to adjust the change and development. The reorganization of a flatter structure[3] diminished the degree of traditional bureaucracy of top-down management and transforming to the collegiality approach [4]. The collegial structure in LIS concentrated participation, group decision-making and consensus. Selected employees in different levels and areas joined together in mutual respect and power can express their ideas and suggestions freely and accurately. Communication and integration within the organization then improved through group decision-making. Strong group cohesiveness within groups was created. The continuous development of leadership style and motivation on individual staff inthe 1990's [5] reflected the importance on the Human Resource Management. The strategic approaches stressed on the basis of mutual trust, commitment, coordination, integration and maximization of the human effort.
The developments of management styles over the last 50 years were the efforts of hundred of theorists and they are continually moving on. These contributors were a step in front of the managers or librarians to tackle and react to the changes. The variables of change are depended on the external environment and internal reaction i. e. technological change in the LIS in the last 20 years like an earthquake, which have vibrated the traditional structure. New Service such as on line catalogue required extra technique on computer. The librarians may not have knowledge on computer, is hard to image how works are designed and carry out. Participation of member in cataloguing and computer department can help to develop the system and execute the operation.
In the pace the 21st century, it is believed the management is continued to focus on individual motivation, more delegation, more flatter structure so as to achieve maximization on the human utility.
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BIBLIOGRAPHIES
1 HODGETTS, Richard M., KUROLKO, Donald F. Management, 3 ed. Harcourt Brace, 1991.chapter 1,2
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3 DESSLER Cary. Human Resource Management, 6 ed. N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1994, chapter 1,2
4 HAMPTON David R. Management, 3 rd. McGraw-Hill, 1987. chapter 2
5 STATT David A. The Concise Dictionary of Management. London: New York, Routledge, 1991
6 JOHANNSEN Hano and PAGE. Terry. International Dictionary of Management, 4 ed. Kogan Page, 1990
7 MORRIS Beryl. First Steps in Management. 1996, chapter 1,2
[1] Etzioni, 1964, p3
[2] Tom Peter, In Search of Excellence (1982)
[3] Supported by First Steps in Management, Beryl Morris (1996), Library management styles and structures: a need to rethink:, Maurice B. Line, Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 23(2) June 1991
[4] Feleh A. Alghamdi, The collegial model: its applications and implications for academic libraries,Library Administration & Management, vol. 8, no. 1 (Winter 1994)
[5] First Steps in Management, Beryl Morris (1996)
